In Grozny the equipment suffered severely from the civil war, and its restoration will require an expenditure of 20—30 million gold rubles. The cost of materials necessary for current operation is estimated for Grozny at the same sum. For Baku, where there has not been major destruction, materials for proper operation would require 250—300 million gold rubles...

...The disruption of transport, the shortage of timber, cement, pipes, rope, iron, and all manner of auxiliary materials, the general disruption of production and of life as a whole as a consequence of the upheaval and national strife...all these factors explain sufficiently why no more than one-third of the existing wells are being worked and operated in the oil fields...

[2—3]...Even with an allocation of 200—300 million in gold it is difficult to hope for rapid procurement of the extremely diverse, substantially American material...

[3] One must not forget either that we have these resources in the form of gold rubles, and the realization of such quantities of gold by ordinary methods would require no less than half a year's time.

Can the situation be radically changed through the granting of concessions? Yes, provided there is a sufficiently bold and decisive concession policy...

...Salvation is possible, I repeat, only through a very bold! and decisive! policy, which must consist in offering to three or four rival major syndicates competing on the world market, as well as to the governments of Italy, perhaps also France and Belgium, sufficiently attractive tracts in respectable sections of the Baku and especially of the Grozny regions...Such a lease would not represent any capitulation before capitalism even in these regions, since in the hands of Glavkoneft all the best and most extensive tracts will still! remain. Concessions can and must be linked with the construction of oil pipelines, the strengthening of railway rolling stock, the delivery to the oil-producing regions from abroad of all necessary materials and provisions and supplies for the workers...

...Rational operation of existing wells and proper laying down and drilling (as well as water pumping, cementing, etc.) of new wells can likewise be made subject to fairly precise! contractual conditions.

1 Krasin's memorandum is dated 8 February; evidently Lenin familiarized himself with it before the Politburo session (16 February) at which the question of oil concessions was discussed.